1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a voice information transfer system.
2. Description of the Related Art
As an example of a voice information transfer system for performing voice information transfer between two apparatuses, there is a system for writing/reading voice information in/from an IC card. In this case, a contact terminal is provided to the IC card, and this contact terminal is mechanically connected to a terminal on the information writing/reading apparatus side to electrically exchange a signal, thereby realizing the system. However, when the IC card is repeatedly used in this manner, the contact surface of the contact terminal is worn to tend to cause occurrence of an information write or read error. For this reason, malfunction of the IC card itself tends to occur, resulting in a degradation in reliability and a difficulty in ensuring predetermined durability.
To solve this problem, Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 5-46824 discloses an information write/read system for an IC card, which converts information into an optical signal and transfers the optical signal, thereby writing/reading information without mechanical contact.
To record voice information transferred and stored by this method, a solid-state memory is generally used. However, since the recording capacity of a solid-state memory is smaller than those of other media, the voice information need to be transferred to a recording medium capable of recording data in a larger quantity. For example, a tape recorder is connected to an external output terminal of the apparatus to transfer voice information stored in a solid-state memory to a magnetic tape.
However, in the system described in the above Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 5-46824, a certain operation by the user is required to start information transfer. Such an operation performed by an unexperienced user may result in an erroneous operation.
In addition, when voice information stored in a solid-state memory is to be transferred to a magnetic tape, troublesome operations including connection are required. Additionally, the sound quality of the recorded voice information is undesirably degraded because of mismatching between the signal level of the external output terminal and that of the input terminal of a tape recorder.